While “Mayberry R.F.D.” was the last episode that audiences saw aired on CBS, the final episode filmed of The Andy Griffith Show was the penultimate “A Girl for Goober.” This episode featured Andy, Opie, Helen, Goober, and Sam (though Aunt Bee was absent). In many ways, “A Girl for Goober” feels like a better conclusion to The Andy Griffith Show, if not just because of the way these characters (minus Aunt Bee, of course) are handled by the CBS series. Sure, it still feels more like your standard Andy Griffith hour than a series finale, but it’s a bit closer than “Mayberry R.F.G.” ever got.
In this episode, Goober is looking for love and ends up matching (via a test he took and sent back in the mail) with an intellectually fervent young woman, Dr. Edith Gibson (Nancy Malone), who is leagues beyond him. Nevertheless, he pursues her as his friends Andy and Sam already have beautiful young women by their sides, hoping he can find the same. Of course, things don’t play out the way Goober might’ve liked, and when it’s revealed that he’s not the brainiac Edith thought he was, things end shortly after.
But she comes around to Goober in the end, and while we don’t expect he and this doctor are going to tie the knot, it gives him hope for his future. The last scene of the episode puts Andy, Sam, and Goober at the police station as they talk about life and love. Again, it’s not exactly a perfect conclusion for our characters, but it’s better than many of them not appearing at all, as was the case with “Mayberry R.F.D.”
According to MeTV, The Andy Griffith Show officially wrapped on February 21, 1968, with “A Girl For Goober.” That evening, the cast and crew reunited in Toluca Lake for a wrap party to celebrate their 249 episodes together. Griffith, who had already had a tough time uttering his final line filmed for the show (a question he poses to Goober at the end of the episode), didn’t have much to say to his Andy Griffith Show family. “Well, it’s been awfully good,” he told them. “It’s been the best eight years of my life. I’ll see ya again.” For a man who brought so much joy for so many years, it turns out that sometimes even Andy Griffith doesn’t have all the words to say.
